“Someone keeps forgetting to buy a coffee pot for us,” I said as he sat next to Rae.
“Didn’t know it was my job,” he said, nodding to the taps. “What the hell. When in Rome.”
Reluctantly pouring Hudson a beer, I slid it over to him.
“Do I smell Devine’s cinnamon donuts?” he looked around the bar.
At his question, Rae’s eyes met mine and we both promptly burst out laughing.
“It might be funny now,” I said to Rae, Hudson clearly confused. “But it won’t be tonight after work when this taste of Kitchi Falls continues. There’s something else you need to try later, and I won’t take no for an answer.”
She was going to say no. Rae may have slipped up just now, but she really did not want to give into me. I was just going to have to change her mind.
Rae opened her mouth. “Ah,” I said, preempting her. “Unless you’re about to say, ‘Sounds good,’ or ‘Can’t wait,’ I don’t want to hear it.”
Rae closed her mouth, but I wasn’t worried. I had all day to convince her that going to dinner with me was a really good fucking idea.
TWENTY
rae
“I am not goingto dinner with you.”
After that epic fuck up today, not to mention discovering Marco was actually human after being with him all day, it was the right thing to say.
“Why?” he asked as the last few stragglers left. We were sitting at a high-top in the corner of the brewery, Marco showing me the weather sites he used and how weather impacted their operations.
“Are you feeling a little deja-vu? Because I think we had this conversation Saturday night.”
“Things have changed,” he said. Relentless.
“No,” I disagreed. “They haven’t.”
In response, Marco planted his elbow on the table, parted his lips and bit the tip of his tongue as a reminder. As if I needed one.
“A mistake.”
The corner of his lip curled upward. He was really something else. Smart. And way more considerate than I’d been expecting. After running into town to get his sister donuts, we’d spent the morning at the brewery until leaving to walk the property at lunch. Passing by the parking lot on the way to the vines where I met Grado’s vineyard manager, Marco practically ran to a car as if something was wrong. In fact, it was an older gentleman who apparently lost his wife to cancer a few months back and now visited Grado every Thursday. Marco helped him from the car and apologized to me when he walked with him all the way back to the Wine Cellar.
And yet, he was the same Marco I’d first met. His edge firmly intact, especially around his family. When I thought about my temporary lapse in judgment this morning, I wished I could kick myself in the ass. I was not some role-reversed Odysseus with Marco the siren using sexy bedroom eyes and a cinnamon donut to lure me in.
In all fairness, it wasn’t really just the bedroom eyes. Or the donut incident. It was, “You're perfect.” I despise my love/hate relationship with my body. Like joining the gym and refusing food I wanted, even in moderation, to save a few calories. How Marco picked up on that, I wasn’t sure.
“You don’t need to lose a fucking pound, Rae.”
I didn’t need validation from him, so why did that refrain play over and over in my mind all day?
“Not a mistake,” he said now. “But that’s not the point. I won’t touch you, promise. It’s just a dinner. There’s a place locals go that I know you’ll love.”
I really needed a backbone. “No flirting?”
He made a face. “Can’t promise that. But no touching, unless you ask for it, of course.”
Which I wouldn’t be doing, so what harm could there be in having dinner?
With the hottest guy on the planet you can’t seem to shake from your thoughts and who’s made his intentions clear?
Best not to answer that question.